


It's A Marshmallow World In The Winter

by giveb



Category: Better Watch Out (2016)
Genre: Christmas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-18
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:21:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22324747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/giveb/pseuds/giveb
Summary: Instead of the hasty cover-up succeeding, Ricky DOES spot Ashley!
Kudos: 2





	1. Chapter 1

"If you drink this, it all goes away." What goes away, disappear and fritters away in her field of vision would be the strands and wisps of hair with raising her head high. As they fall down to her side, it would all resemble one lion's mane with her sense of pride."We don't have to do this." Is the opera singer's line. The setting seems like one chandelier, glass ceiling, one cold and unfeeling tile and plaster plafond- some vault trying with it's cash for the check on emotion, some orchestral pit trying to covet pity. And the conductor's baton was raised for the start of the crescendo, the first agonizing and antagonizing climb over the hill...  
Lerner drops the ball of tension, severs the tendons of the dramatic beat by saying, "Garrett, hold her down." It would have been the closest he had ever gotten to his original dare and ideal suggestion of having to hold her. Being one of the audience members to the electrifying symphony, Garrett's hesitant to leave his seat and standing at the white desk and step onto the stage. He stalls and moves with one mumble or grumble, some note of doubt. "Um..." with the inner monologue of "What the fuck?" And he steps over to the spotlight and taped-x-marks-the-spot, there is one final glance at the flashlight used earlier, washing out the scene.  
At that previous moment where the champagne was close enough to her, the rolling of the eyes was the rolling through of her options for this high situation. The plan and course of action would be to tense up and tear around, smack her head forward and shoot that motherfucking bottle to Earth. If that whole bottle was held in her hand, even if her wrist was tied there were ton and landfills of anger that could fend off and wield the glass- or it could have also been the same for the little nylon handle braided off of the light. If this had to all be one art installation, it would be this monstrous combination of motor engines and the heavier generators, one kitsch collection and presentation of all robot mechs wielded together, and the serpentine belt and all converging forces are given to one two-inch metal mace or helicopter blade. Right now, with her tied wrists, her hands could have outmatched any hydraulic presses. If there was anything possible like one werewolf transformation, her newfound claws would be out.  
Wasn't the weather outside cold, and has the steam churning out of her ears been enough to radiate and change the room? It hadn't been enough to reach and register in Garrett's point of view, and so he's raising his hands toward the nuclear reactor with the personification of all zig-zag frowns of confusion. There would be the tick-tocks of the clock or the couple of pulses being the subway, train and tram lines before Garrett gently places his baby-carrot fingers towards the grinding-teeth, bared and barbed aura swarming around Ashley. If there was one bridge between Luke and Garrett, then all of the pedestrians walking across would be tipping their hats while walking across. The atoms in his hands are all shaking-quivering-unstable and decomposing unknowingly at the plastered fury and flakes building up. And the freight train of the railway glass bottle is held at it's neck like cars are held like dandelion tufts or feathers and it's barreled down toward Ashley station.  
He doesn't really know where to rest in place and nail down, Garrett's unsure on what moves and thrashing can occur when she's threatened like this. He's as weak as the itty-bitty stems making up the hemp and weed of his socks. Luke brings the stampeding bubbling buffalo herd closer and closer towards the mountainous and rooted cliff's edge... There could be one knife-on-acrylic creak and scrape before they topple over...  
There's this little plead of saying, "Is there any funnel?" and then its off! Instead of his house-of-cards construction around her cheeks, he's struggling to wrap over the titanic tear and wrestling bore-and-boar-hole. The champagne's all spilling over his layers and hoodie as it's quickly becoming one tooth-and-nail house foundation shaking match. It's like one tornado with four wooden corners and there's no possible insulation that could block out the scratches, snaps, and bangs! Apart from the eye and center of the storm, there's only one wooden bang on the door that's outside of the centrifuge, and that single knock haggles and halts the tracks.From the outermost layer, edge and remainder, and flurrying storm zone of snow, from after the screen door, submarine glass door, from the ten thousand leagues and leas apart from the twister's root-tearing grounds, Ricky's pitter-patter on the door sounds like chainsaws on ice. It's all carving away at that frozen-over hell that Luke-Lucifer's in charge of. Even though the screen and appearance of this whole creation had been grayed down for the audience, the intense scene hadn't appeared washed out. The feather framed on the far wall was an absolute contrast and juxtaposition to the struggle sprayed out, the number of scoots that her chair had traveled was more than the leaning scooter nearby. It took a lot out of Garrett to hold onto the flailing marlin, yellowfin, barracuda, arapaima and electric eel that Ashley had been. The world had been like one snow cone, the syrup and spilling wine had gotten all over them and the floor. There might have been some tea-and-tablespoons of the champagne that could have been poured down, but eventually spat back up. This whole reluctance to drinking it down was another red-label-or-flag towards this dilemma, and Garrett let go of his all-encompassing hug on Ashley. The doorbell made everyone speechless for one moment, three arrowheads of attention at the noise.  
The quickest greyhound and rabbit, reaction to spring, was Ashley's cry for "HEEELP!" It was like the Anemone, Beehive, Castle, Cliff, Daisy, Echinus and Great Geysers, and the eruption there couldn't be covered enough. Thinking of sheets of canvas and heavy denim toppling over one source of fire and smoke, or hands over one jacuzzi jet, the rings of paint samples saying no in all different voices. And the shades of vermillion green, teal and robin's egg blue muddled her attempt somewhat but did not stop up all of the steam.  
The combined dog-pile managed to get the spiked-collar and steel duck tape on again, before Luke leapt to action. To his general, colonel, captain, sergeant and lieutenant: "Stay calm. Stay here and clean this up." Locked and loaded, Garret nods were in exact proportion to how buildings lean their towering weight during their demolitions. It was one entire-act of a crash-and-crumble, drizzling of the spilt-champagne as if his jacket lint was asbestos, requiring the large-quantity of twenty-sixty thousand gallons of fire-hose drenching. The stairs and steps of escaping, the foundations and flooring of his reality break down from seemingly-endless slabs to mere crumbling pebbles.  
When it comes to the music, was that preloaded from earlier? Was it Deandra's selection earlier for background music, or had it been Luke's prime pick to later dance to, if everything had been in his favor? Was this from one radio station and random assortment, or the crafted playlist for discs and flashdrives, stuck in people's heads? The turntable turns out another choice in the genre, and the sweet and wonderful harmony bounces outward. The lacy do-do-do's matching up with Lerner's steps and advise about the door's fisheye. Do stare at the strangeness out there, do keep your clammy hands on the doorknob, and do look towards the fishy business about to weigh the scales.  
"Ricky?" It was one strange apparition and manifestation, like Zebra Danios, Black Dragonfish, Dana Octopus Squids, Cookiecutter Sharks, Flashlight Fish, Angler Fish in the deep-blue submarine lense of the peephole.  
"Yeah man, open the door." It was like one sample of fly-fishers, pearl divers, river-bottom cleaners and crab-trap netters. There were all kinds of baits and reasons attached at the hook for this moment, many explanations for why the line and sinker was dropped down here. Above the water's surface, the rippling aqua chorus and verses arise and clip in too early. It was all technicolor, it was all terrifying with those cotton candy shades that glitched the Aphro-"bro"-dite Venus coming out of the waves and onto the sea-shell silver porch.  
"She's not here." There was one quick tilt and whirl, survey and radar of the door and coat-hangers piercing around the frame like one circle of knife-wielders making their gang ensnare. One clear state, one clean slate, and one prepared table for Battleship. He notices the floor-polish, the bits and pieces brought to-and-fro, and the boots and scarves slightly out-of-place before nudging them with his heel. The checkerboard exchange, strands of the wool scarves resembled grids of electric fencing.  
"Listen. I know she's in there. She texted me to come over like half an hour ago." The Great-White surrounding and swimming around the cast-cage that the Lerner residence had become had noticed the vibrations trailing back to the common-room, the single drop of blood miles away in the soupy-air. The Red Sea was starting to part with the heavy-lifting arms-legs-and-smiles in his expression.  
From the rising currents, Lerner. "She doesn't want to see you"  
From the rocky bottom and footer, Ricky, holding one rake on the sand garden setting. Maybe the snow and roadway gravel and wood-shavings could substitute. "I just want to talk to her."  
"Go away. She doesn't love you, she told me." His fingertip rails, trams, trails around in spirals and webs of lies. He rubs the shoulder of his crochet sweater and embroidered suit of armor, though more tightly-knit inside. The inner-echo chamber of introductions mentions another drop...  
There would be two contrasting fields of color palettes for either side of the door. The white section and blank face to Ricky has had snowflakes float to it, then ride across the wooden cheek like weeping tears, while Lerner's control of the ears-hair-back-of-the-head-and-neck has been shaving off any stubble-wool-fleece-hide-pelt-mane, leaving one bald head shiny enough to reflect the whirlwind inside the house.  
"ASHLEY! ASHLEY, COME ON!" Thinking of tightly-wound bungee cords cut off, pieces superglued together then cracked apart, parts smelted together then melted into separation, a thunk-punch-knock enough to knock Luke away from the door happens like one gong being rung.  
There would be cannon blasts, felt from the third floor to even the basement, that crashed and shook sawdust onto the floor.  
"Dude, Shut up! She doesn't want to see you!" It would be like mountains upon hampers upon clotheslines of smothering rugs, fabric dowries, all the wool sheared off sheep, whole button and loose yarn collections... If there was one metal-detector for heavy textiles, tissues and webs, it would be that result from scanning the whole world. It would be if all of the world's fluffiness and sound insulation was propped up with only the thinnest and weakest little-twig.  
"Alright. Hey, listen man. Can you give her these, please?" The window had become one well-dew, one dam and sugar-glass about to be approached by the flailing spiked fruit punch bowl. Instead of the ear-screeching and terrifying noise of smearing against glass, there was the intense pitter-patter of rain. All neighborhood potted plants were dripping, all weeds got their shares. Shingles had gotten more snow, and the literal sprays of salt had helped to melt it partway. An ax towards the stump were these flowers towards the bullseye of the boulder-door like one bucket or water-pistol. There was one fruity and floral, sweet scent for the conflict here with all of the pollen and nectar thrown out. Almost all of the world's pleasures portrayed in the lilies & violets & hydrangeas & tulips & peonies, the second sphere and half of the living kingdom, sowed-embedded outside the picket-door.  
Luke loosened up and said it would be fine. That endless and trailing whip and massive fan of flowers left the compartment. The shadows and stained-glass crept down and away. The threatening looming pall and gloom retreated out.  
"Pass them through the door." As the musical chairs and notes became twinkling carnival carousel merry-go-round sounds with their own lee-way and ribbons, the gears were moving towards opening the door.  



	2. Chapter 2

Garrett had been moping around and mopping the record of spilt champagne. When it comes to the fibers of the cloth, it would all have to correspond to the fiber-rich diet all being sweated and shook out at this moment. The paper towels souped up the bubbly, puffed up in their wetness and felt like shaking someone's sweaty hand when picked up. He had squeegeed and twisted out the worrying water into the sink at least two or three times before throwing each reused towel away. He had considered even reaching his paw and arm into the trash even further to grab the napkins used at previous meals to help with this task. It couldn't have been noted now, but there was one trail of crumbs in the form of loose hairs that had been forming against the brilliant brown flooring.  
Ashley, locked in the metal parrot cage or straining on the chain like one raving bulldog, staring daggers and shurikens into his back. In her imagination it would have been enough to have him look like one porcupine. Or as one scaredy-cat chicken, feathers poking out. Or with the moppy head of hair falling and covering his point of view in all of the possible textures hair can bring, one pekingese or LaPerm.  
Flipping off some Rhode-Island-small statements, turning rolling-blind eyes or only glazing over your mind's film-over when some questionable little jabs were taken. That's what the whole scenario had been so far. Now it's only the minute-jiffy jetty-stage of these chores. The general lapping of the tumbled-overturned drink was beginning to be one mind-wandering-reminder of jet-skis, skijoring... boats and other steering-wheel maneuverables...  
Staring at disconnected back-of-hands like the bald-heads of movie-goers sitting in-front, shadowed pieces of people making up the obstructing frame of any feature-blockbuster, the mental image and stream-of-thought-movie was.... with these thieving-quick motions making up the night. Wouldn't it have been more interesting to pull of any heist and buggarize banks instead? If the neighbors surrounding here were out and about, experiencing curbside tulip festivals and rose parades of their own with the variety of snowmen about as they head to any fundraiser or charity dinner, couldn't this night have been spent breaking-and-entering other houses? Or slingshotting stones or feeding any migrating animals? Riding the weirder loot-box additional vehicles of multiplayers, cruising the stranger side of scooters and skateboards around the block. Or the lawn-mower like one zamboni....  
_With the expertise with the lawn-mower, Lerner had been the one to drive the car earlier. It hadn't required pairs of pliers to take out the knife stuck into the tire rubber, but there was one Excalibur-sword-in-the-stone wiggle and tread-tug to take out. Only that first wheel had been punctured and the other three left untouched. The hiss of air was the blank-gunshot given by snake-referees to drive into any underbrush or hiding location, courtesy of any repo-repossession cases. The passenger door opened how bobsledders start their sprints, and Garrett had hopped inside as Luke pulled ahead. He had been eye-high of grins and smiles as he buckled his seatbelt. Garrett's twinkle and beam was as if the headlights and highbeams curved through the window and pointed inside, if the interior lights were pushing the battery to the limit with their brightness. It hadn't really entered Garrett's mind why this little nudge and automotive adjustment had been made as he commented on joyriding, top notch-full-speed ahead like Santa's sled for the night instead._  
_The spick-and-span spanning car floor mats had been gingerly swept and the gloves gripping the steering wheel were the disposable kind, not the gentlest arrangement and posing of white cotton, chalk and lace of any chauffeur. The total distance traveled was closer to one heave-ho and push made when it was left in neutral, because it was only pavers far. Crossing around to look through the rear-windshield, Garrett's disbelieve was through the form of, "What? That was like, shorter than Anglo-Zanzibar War... We didn't move further, feather, than Dali's moustache." The motions before his eyes were this: Luke reached and grabbed for the glove compartment, and the curiosity to unlock the compartment opened flood-gates, avalanches of knick-knack notes, and receipts, looking like limestone encased around the prehistoric fossil of one Thomas Guide. Luke's expression could have been slipped and pasted into The Descent, The Journey To The Center of The Earth, A Passage To India... Any poster-cover or trailer-snippet where it's man facing the expansive, endless-void cavern. It would be one game of Jackstraws and Pick-up Sticks to browse through personal belongings. It hesitantly could-be considered as one sign, that his supposed longing didn't extend into storage. Instead of the karmic slap-on-the-wrists bound to happen to Luke, he slammed and closed the door to the miniature cupboard. It was like chalk being tapped and scratched, underlining the correct answer on any sentence. It was obvious, the puzzle-pieces of clues coming together like icebergs crashing and scraping. The piling snow at the driveway's end could ever-slightly hide the deflated tire, and there was the oil-droplet of temptation to take any looks around the backseat or side-pockets._  
_Well, if the clock's ticking to when the sleeping beauty will- "Well-Um... How about, the last-one-in's a rotten egg?" -and how swimmers push off against the poolsides, Garrett gives Luke one palm-on-the-shoulder before pattering off. Exactly afterwards, like any pull-toy dog on the string or fishing hooks reeling in, Luke hounded inside. And that was that, give-or-take any couple of moments of chatter in the car, as if it had been filtered and filled by Tanked!_ The murky-water memory was swabbed and squeegeed away with the introduction of music coming through the air like diffusers.


	3. Chapter 3

Ricky, the ever-triumphant trooper, had now stepped onto the batting plate, onto the first checkerboard row of the chess-table or first open-island on Minesweeper, tentative first steppings of one mouse-in-a-maze. Any oil-rags or handkerchiefs could be seen as the traveling flag of conquest and victory, encroaching onto Lernerlandia. When it comes to all of the possible fireplace corners and sharpest edges on the table, Luke's imagination of all the possible sallies and assails was turning himself into one Great White Shark or Bottlenose Dolphin circling around one human-shaped school of fish. Cockroaches or Spiders could be envisioned, trailing lines of electrified wire or barbed cables. With all the heaving pieces of wood in this household lodge, it was one coffin abode. And with the Christmas decorations, the chimmy-chiming golden bells would be the safety dead-ringer bell. With the handling and rustled, mishappened chamber, the red-flags of the throw-pillows' drool, the rarely-adjusted curtains now shielding celebrity-sized cardboard cutouts, the tar-treading marks, and blown-out candles weren't noticed in time. "You have pizza?"  
From behind the barrack and trenchline, the reinforcements of sticks, Garrett peeks over the pocket-door casing and jamb. Inside the wolves' den or dragon's layer... Ricky's knightly hand could be made out, illustrated in gold-leaf over silverpoint and adorned with initials and flourishes, reaching into the horde and drey of stockpiled wealth. Well, the wealth in this case couldn't have been held onto long, or handle the division from being one unit of accounting, as the slice was already cold. He spotted Luke for the split-second, Lac-Crimson-and-Carmine with his futile attempts at tugging Ricky, the storming freight-train from reaching ahead. They couldn't meet eyes because the spying peep turned back without being recognized. Maybe if this section of the house had all been dead-silent then there could have been fighting-chances to end the investigation.  
Ashley's bound chair was close enough in height to the granite island to have smacked it like one judge's gavel against the gravel-like striking-top. It was the noise of swarming bees, throngs of hornets, the deafening buzz of cicadas from her side, and the wine bottle was tittering towards the edge. Garrett was joined and stuck in one Christmas Pickle, and there were dozens of hand-spun-and-blown vases, commercial frame coverings, frosted table-covers, other pieces of glass that held his sorry reflection. Instead of the traditional height markers and rulers towering over the background behind his eventual Polaroid, distorted and clownish fun-house mirrors held an image of his startled face.  
He murmured, like one haunting waterfall apparition speaking from sheet-gaps of water, but in this case between the strips of cold sweat beading all-over: "Be quiet please, Please!" With the barrel being held upwards too much, she was already desensitized. There were only closing feet, single-digit number of steps until these plans unravel, and it would be essential to keep her martyrdom to save another. With the yellow accents around the house, they were all signaling the unease and bizarreness, alert and cautionable countdown to what would blow the house down. Garrett fumbles with the gun, and right-about when the safety's clicked off and the chamber about to be checked if it's loaded, the monolith Ricky appears in the doorframe. Dun-dun-DUN! It's one hole-in-the-wall, spotlighted taped-x on the stage to stand post at, and Garrett dashes to face Ricky as fast as humanly possible, steadying himself on gripping the sandwich wall. What would be the most casual callout? Grasping for straws, the flash of inspiration zip-lines from his brain to mouth.  
"Hey- I got"  
Their eye contact was to the song's tune and lines about sweethearts. Instead of the gentle one-at-a-time pace of Cupid's arrows, it would be the overdrive of assault-rifles and gatling guns for the number of thoughts racing about. Pinballs, Hamster-Balls, It was like popcorn was popping inside of his head, rattling his skull. The strongest part of him was the consistency of an uncooked kernel, but everything else and around could crumble and crunch at the moment's notice. It would be one case of racked nerves and frayed wiring, like shredded strings of Christmas lights. Ricky's eagle eye swooping in like one leading-Rudolf landing on the roof.  
"I got the rat."  
The judge, warden, watcher was right in front of him, and this courtroom was two-feet wide at the maximum. The Statue of Liberty or Lady Justice merely nearby, tracking him with the coldest rendition of those walnut eyes. It was like the slow-motion perspective of watching one Oak or Alder tree descending, plummeting down towards you, about to bonk and squish you to smithereens. Instead of Chestnuts roasting over an open fire, it would be the tick-tick of the igniter as the flamethrower's solid line of flame, snake made out of infernos about to strike!  
"Big rat..." Instead of impulsively scratching his shoulder, he went towards the bruise forming on his neck. There had been one habitual network and train-tracks of cat-scratches, dinosaur fossils of layers of pats and punches, tar and feathers or silk and snakeskin that have been over that spot. His shoulder had experienced all sorts of history, dislocations mainly. But, at the end-all final result, that little motion moved his head and blond curtain of hair, and that did reveal Ashley's chair falling towards the floor with the resounding ka-thunk! The scene was in magnified detail behind the little rat, and the gears fall into place about WTF was happening.  
"The fucker was fast, but I got it."  
There couldn't be any last-minute quip nor cheesy smile that could have stopped the scowl forming. The giants and contenders in the ring, they were both wearing plaid. Any distinction between the stripes of colors, any dissertation on the stew of details that made them up was blown to the wind like pieces of dust and sand next to wax birthday candles. The candles would be the relighting joke-kind, with the blistering orange and frying blue reappearing temporarily as sparking sketches, as gestures made out of shooting stars, however the motions were never glittery or worth any wealth at all.  
It was in tune with any jumpscare, Ricky had lunged as his first chess-move, pawn to the prawn, pounced to Garrett. The instinctive moment as one sniper's cross's right on dotting, or the routing-scattering-flight of stampeding Black Friday crowds both took place at this fighting-vessel-battleship floating-fortress-intersection of submarine radars, and the joystick controlling Ricky was forced forward and the buttons furiously smashed-slugged-swinged as if in one Street-Fighter championship. Alongside the bear-spray of his spit shooting out of his mouth, and the close-range air-horn of calling out Ashley's name, she struggles out thanks back from the duct-tape webbing. While duct-tape's glue can clarify, liquefy, soften, deliquesce-and-melt at temperatures higher than 200°F, those sparks-and-ignition of hope began to fictively char away the cuffs.  
Garrett, as if made out of paper-mache under the hoodie, or one tower of playing cards, or stack of dominoes under the shirt-sleeves, lands on his behind with that forceful shove. The earth's groundwork renders him out cold. That brain-bouncing shock sprawls-and-sets him unconscious. If that shove-from-shoulders was one metal shovel smacked against snowmen-heads or scoop against wet-cardboard, Garrett essentially melts out of action as if made from shaved-snow, weaker than powdered-sugar. As if there were ghosts, yule cats and angels surrounding him, those presences and hallucinations would be shoveling topsoil with their nutcrackers and rusty blades or tossing it by the hand-full to make him black-out. If _Black Christmas_ , _Red Christmas_ , _Silent Night Bloody Night_ , _Krampus_ , and _To All A Good Night_ had all existed and intertwined with this canon, then that syncope, seconds-long-coma, and swoon would have been permanent.  
Ricky then pivots-and-spins around to face Luke, who was rearing to leap onto his back, attempting to latch on. Yelping and yodeling one war-whoop, leapfrog-springs onto him. There's one topsy-turvy balance of weight which would have flipped over any raft or plastic kayak, but not enough to overturn Jeeps and Hummers. Would it have been the blood rushing to ears, or the whooshing of throwing fists, that covered up this face that Luke, the engine-red megaphone, had been yelling unintelligibly the whole while? He scrabble-scrambles and bares his claws, shoving them into the direct sight and eyes. Those talons redden Ricky's corners of the mouth and itch the sides of the nose, but as they scrape and scramble closer to his tightly-sealed-shut eyes...  
His reflexes lead him to grapple the oncoming momentum and throw ragdoll Luke headfirst into the fishtank, shattering it. The neon-cyan light for the container sputters out, leaving only the tree-ornaments and blue-bauble-snowflakes as the only shades of lapis and navy. As if the proper color-receptors were smacked and popped-outta-eyes, the complexion of the catastrophe, hue of the hurting, would be seen in tints, tones, and tinges of murky greens and turbid yellows, the casting paint of protanomaly. The ice-cold water soaks through all layers, putting out his liar-liar pants-on-fire, gravel gets stuck to his knees, and the seaweed puts on the film and coating of one wet-dog. If there had been trace-amounts of Necrotizing-Fasciitis alongside blooming Blue-Green Algae, then that pitch-plummet and nosedive into the tank would have gotten it in his eyes. It would have taken longer than one dozen cormorants' dry-time to wring out his wet-waterlogged wings. Even though the pleco-presence prevented grime, the marine-museum's waves felt like raw-sewage-sludge, the filthiest froth around. If his marbles had already been lost this evening, then all the annulus-orotund-circle seashells scattered reflect that nutsy temper. The shattering of the clamps and screens all shoveled-covered up by the clamors and calls to Ashley. "ASHLEY, GET OUT!"  
The snowman Garrett has his vision spiral into the colors of coal, cobblestone and graphite, and the view from the skull-splitting blackout-mountaintops contains... _Instead of moat around his head for rubber-duckies to float about from that full-force fist, he groans to find himself walked into a psychedelic sideaway. Instead of those bumps and batters of hitting the side-table, knocking the flower-planter towards the floor and cascading those coffee-table books down, this dream-like haze registered those vibrations and rumbles as bar-patrons bumping into each other. That clonk against the mat-and-floorcloth? That instead must-have been the venue's lower ceilings here! The roof's probably raising up with the ruckus and uproar about. The spiraling scene's mainly dusky and indistinct, kept dark with only one thin-neon line of lighting. There's the visual chatter and rumble of phosphenes dancingly-dusting and coating the mental-tableau._  
After the canon-ball shot and cymbal sound of falling backwards, Ashley's chair flips after the tumble-roll over and she elbows and crawls towards the back door. The main-stay rug drags along with the colossal birch sapling of the spindle and splat. With the turtle-like appearance of wriggling with wood, it would actually be one record-breaking pace that results from the four-point floundering into the marshmallow-mashup and evergreen trees of the yum-yummy yard. Going, Going, Gone!  
Her headbutt breaks the patio-door windows and fortuitously, there's one tarantula-black kitty outside on the snow for her, stark against the field of white. Alongside the newfound rush of chilly winds, there would be the chilling gaze of those cat-eyes into Ashley's. As soon as it was noticed, the first-responder and good-luck symbol slips away after that brief-bounty was coughed out like hairballs.  
_That imaginary interlude's waves wash-away the static of twinkles and tingles_ and Garrett realizes that the heavyweight-handgun was still in his grasp. With the lead-dead poundage of the shooting-iron, it would almost seem like the monstrous circus-strongman thousand-pound dumbbell shown across crowds, pinning him down with unimaginable gravity against the clammy champagne leftovers. He's about to shake-and-shutter, wiggle his fingers and gain feeling in his sleeves for-the-sake-of lifting it up before Luke blunders-trips over his hand as he stumbles across the living room, having the goldfish unstick and flop onto his opposite palm. Simultaneously as Garrett's "Ouch, Man!", Luke realizes his mistake in the heat of the moment and helps him up. Those seconds standing up snap-away instantly in the million-mile racing of the mind & ticking of the clock. That grasp unclasps as Luke pounds the pavement in pursuit!  
The duo make their career-charge against Ricky but are left to bite the dust as the snowflakes sprinkle in. Another round and Tour de France, tour de force, of branches pulled back, overturning lawn ornaments, caterwaul complaints and insults end their chase and trail. The patio-doors rattle as they swing aimlessly. If anyone in the safe neighborhood had leaned out their windows, they would have seen the sight of Ricky sprinting and carrying the chair that Ashley had made progress from getting out of. The back-posts and rear legs had been snapped off, and the chair-arms fractured. In what only could have been considered one Halloween-themed postal-delivery of one crumpled skeleton or child-in-a-cage-hoisted-by-a-gorilla, or the bitter arrival of Krampus himself, snatching away the most promising youth. Alongside the burning rubber and sports-car wheels blast-heating, steaming the snow off the sidewalks, there is one one lingering and caterpillar-climbing cramp in Ricky's grasp in this contorted bridal-carry marathon. The most defining image of the night would be this gallop and chase, stretching over concrete-cliffs and blizzard-deserts. It was of no-concern if this manhunt was heading east or west, north or south, as the manor-maze had it's share of outlets.  
After the long-haul down streets-strips, where the houses all-but melt into indistinct backgrounds, many without any lights-on inside, they juke-it between brick-wall alleyways, then snapping to take off the binding-tape. Betwixt the beating of huff-and-puffs, Ashley gasps out one short-winded thanks to Ricky. The dimmest moonlight curtsies and bows off of the thickest key-rings of knuckle-busters, miniature screws wrapped up in their secrecy. The steam-and-smoke of their panting makes another globe of white compared to la luna above. The locus of motion rises from the jogtrot of vamoosing limbs to nimble fingers, and the forest is focused-and-concentrated to the twigs-of-ten-digits tugging at the duck-tape.  
There's one frantic looking through of the couple's pockets to find something sharp to shred strap-strips into stripes, but they instead find the winding end of the tape roll wrapped-around her wrists. The turning-and-turning of the tape doesn't make as-much of a-peep than expected, and soon enough, like the removal of one plastic bag or bottleneck-ring removed from one turtle, or fishing line unwound from gull's wings, one limb-and-arm gains freedom, then another-and-another. One arm, one leg, both legs, then both arms. As the furniture-skeleton breaks apart, another skeleton steps in. Garrett stumbles upon them at the last moment- **CLICK**... but finds-the-fault that the cylinder's chamber was empty. There was the split-second realization of who is holding more power, as that wooden chair-club could be lobbed, or any brains dashed out against brick. The satellite above and sleet down all reflect the white-flag of admitting defeat, that there's no matching-way to defeat them, and their piercing-pupils chill his steel-colder than hell's depths. With one Aye-Aye worthy look towards them and towards the merry lane of where he came from, he makes like a mollycoddle-milksop baby by heading out. Garrett's resignation-and-dismissal is recognized with two slight sighs of relief.  
Topping it all-off, Lerner's nowhere to be found, and the walk-of-shame doesn't show the second-set of footsteps trailing far-along. At the dreadful trudging return, it would be one coin-flip:  
In the first percentage Luke would still there, tapping his feet and holding onto any stolen cash, sellable watches, ready to ride into the sunset from authorities.   
In the second percentage the house is strikingly empty, blast-furnace stoves and open-flames left on, essentially left for dead and left to burn down. The reaction to the arson-or-even-insurance-fraud would be one defeated turnaround and brushing-aside of the blaze. The flames tickle the cabinets, char those cookbooks to-ashes, and slapdash-lick the plafond, and all he musters up are shrugs and the sense to step away before the smoke-alarm notices the emergency. What-again? What were those supposed shattered-knees or swiss-cheese feet going to mean, if those bullets were actually loaded-and-live when he fired? How the hell could attempted-murder be explained away, what thinly-veiled white-lie can be concocted from what-just-happened? When he reaches his own stoop, and it's his sister welcoming him in, will that be the moment that this irreversable-nightmare nullifies? 


End file.
